What Happened To Kim Basinger And Alec Baldwin?
For a minute there, actors Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger's relationship made perfect sense and even seemed kind of romantic. The two met in 1990 on the set of The Marrying Man, and ironically, they got married three years later. Together, the two lovebirds had their only child, Ireland, in 1995. To the outside world, their separation in 2000 came as a surprise, but the couple's close friends and family saw it coming a mile away.
Basinger's father Don told People in a 2001 interview, "I've known for a year and a half that she was thinking about this. I love Alec. He's the most kind and generous man I've ever known in my life, and he's overcome some very difficult things." He added, "All but one: his anger. Alec has this kind of anger where he reaches down for something that hurts, something that may have happened a year or two ago, and then abuses Kim with it."
The events that followed their inevitable 2002 divorce eventually had a happy ending, but not without damaging words and actions in between.
Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger had a pretty weird relationship early on
During their filming days, it was pretty clear that Kim Basinger and Alec Baldwin were intense together — to say the least. People reported that on the set of The Marrying Man, Basinger said, "He kissed me and then asked me if I wanted kids." She called him "psychotic" before telling him to "stick to the movie."
In response to the name-calling, Baldwin apparently called a friend and said, "She's driving me insane. And we're getting married." Yikes! After their anticipated divorce, the custody battle that followed was long and nasty. In a 2013 interview with The Guardian, Baldwin compared those six years to the Indochina War.
"That point of my life is a blur. I know exactly what projects I was doing from 1986 to 2000," he said. "And then from 2000 to 2006, during the Dien Bien Phu of my divorce litigation... I can barely tell you what I did for those six years. It was a period that was so painful, I was staring off a cliff for six years."
Alec Baldwin's notorious temper manifested in an irate voicemail to his 11-year-old daughter
It's one thing to hear about Alec Baldwin's temper, but it's another to actually hear it. The world got more insight into the Baldwin-Basinger lifestyle in 2007 when a voicemail sent from Baldwin to his then-11-year-old daughter, Ireland Basinger Baldwin, made headlines.
In the message (via National Post), Baldwin called Ireland a "rude, thoughtless little pig." He went on to say, "I don't give a damn that you're 12 years old, or 11 years old, or that you're a child, or that your mother is a thoughtless pain in the a** who doesn't care about what you do as far as I'm concerned... Once again I have made an a** of myself trying to get to a phone. You have humiliated me for the last time with this phone."
The voicemail became evidence in the custody battle between Baldwin and Kim Basinger, which resulted in a joint custody decision, per E! News, and $3 million in legal costs. Surprisingly in a 2012 Page Six interview (per National Post), Ireland said that it wasn't that serious. "For me it was like, 'OK, whatever.' I called him back I was like, 'Sorry dad, I didn't have my phone.' That was it," she said. Just normal parent-child drama, right? Maybe so, since the she was able to joke about the entire thing on Instagram in 2015.
Kim Basinger said everything's good now between the former lovers
It took some time (possibly blood, sweat, and tears included), but Kim Basinger and Alec Baldwin eventually got to a peaceful and amicable spot. In a 2016 interview with The Edit (via People), Basinger said that she and Baldwin were in a better place.
"[Alec and I are] cool now, though," she said. "Life goes on." After the very public and overly dramatic divorce, Baldwin went on to marry his current wife Hilaria Thomas in 2012. The happy couple have four children — Leonardo, Carmen Gabriela, Romeo Alejandro, and Rafael — and are currently working on their fifth (go big or go home, right?).
As for Basinger, her current passion in life is animal rights. In a 2018 interview with Samaritan Mag, she said, "There's so many things — the wild animals in the poaching situation. I'm working on something 24/7 with the Humane Society, as well as with my daughter, Ireland." Clearly, she's keeping busy and putting her passion to good use.